


wait like the dawn, how it aches to meet the day

by bruised_fruit



Series: unhealed and rotting [6]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Far Post-Canon, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Low Self Esteem, obsession/limerence/ocd, past death, referenced self injury, using illusory magic for depressing purposes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-26 14:37:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23071426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bruised_fruit/pseuds/bruised_fruit
Summary: Going out to sea isn’t good for him, but it’s all he knows how to do. The sea is for grief. The sea is for pretending you can ever recover.
Relationships: past Davenport/Lucretia
Series: unhealed and rotting [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1654714
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	wait like the dawn, how it aches to meet the day

**Author's Note:**

> this is a repost, but unlike other things i reposted after deleting everything during my episode last year, i'm not keeping the old publication date. it's not exactly the same fic anymore
> 
> here's a pic of some grapefruit:  


“Fuck,” he breathes, and he’ll dispel the illusion soon. It’s been three days since he’s last slept, and so he tries to touch her—like an idiot, and he knows better than anyone on any plane what a fool he is for trying and trying and trying—but please, _ please, _if he could just touch her again... 

He’d do anything to have her again, even just for a short time. As soon as his fingers touch the damned thing, it fades away and leaves him alone again, of course it does, and his heart aches just as much as always, familiar and throbbing and painful like nothing else. 

He lets out a noise of frustration and blows another spell slot, another Lucretia, this illusion just as flat and fake, nowhere near as beautiful, as sweet and soft and brilliant. He’s numb to the disappointment and the hurt, but it still lingers. It permeates his skin, it lives in him.

This one talks, and her voice is a cheap imitation, and it’s words she’d never say, or words she’d said thousands of times but never again, and he’ll never hear her real voice again, he remembers, and he grabs at her, his hand passing through her shin. Davenport swears as her form fades away. If he could touch her… but that’d be worse, wouldn’t it? Just touching something that isn’t her, doesn’t talk like her, doesn’t think like her, isn’t loving and particular and wonderful and her.

He’s thought about it, of course. It would be much easier than clutching at these miserable illusions. But it would be just as frustratingly insufficient, sleeping with a being Altered to look like her… he allows himself a laugh, short and humorless. Over a century and a half, and he’s the same kid he was back on their home world, letting himself pretend strangers were as good as the real thing, constantly fantasizing that the one he really wanted would lower himself to touch him, to want him in spite of his body, his personality, everything that makes him him. 

There’s some inherent unlovability to him that Lucretia had him believing wasn’t there. But now that she’s gone, he can see it again. 

She was so much more than anyone else ever was to him. No one could ever, ever compare to her.

It’s that, really, more than what she gave him. Everyone’s a pale imitation to the most amazing woman he’s ever known. The woman who gave him everything in their century of near-constant suffering, took it all away for his sake, protected him and suffered for him and fought to win for him, who loved him and comforted him better and more than anyone else ever could. Who let him feel like he had connection, finally, after he was so sure he was doomed to a lifetime completely alone—

Davenport feels himself sob, though he can’t hear it. The blood’s pounding in his ears. He claws at himself, imagining her face. He allows himself a Silent Image, supplements it with a Minor Illusion, some meaningless words, because they’re not hers, though the voice matches hers perfectly. 

She is—was—just so beautiful. Her voice was—is—so gorgeous, and everything she said to him too kind.

She’s dead, his brain supplies, and he’s weeping now, openly, and it calms him a little, though he’s not grieving, not anywhere close—he’ll never accept it, how could she be _ gone? _ He’s still waiting to hear her voice. To feel her again. 

And he’s waiting to see her face, when he’s with her again, that small smile of hers, the warmth in her eyes, the familiar tiredness to her that he never managed to do anything about, but still, she was always so warm—but she was cold last time he saw her, all drained and unhappy. 

He retches, but it’s fine it’s fine, it’s fine, he remembers her hand on his back and the slick warmth of her against his inner thigh and the words she’d whisper in his ear that made him feel safe and alive and loved when they drifted off to sleep together. 

He misses her touch, remembering the softness, the carefulness, the intentionality of her hand over his. It was near-constant, especially when the two of them were alone together. They used to kiss each other, press against each other, intuitive about what the other wanted in every indulgence, needy and wanting even after everything.

He hasn’t touched anyone in so long. He misses contact so much. They used to touch like second nature, when they were alone and she hadn’t ripped his memories and his personality out of his skull. When was the last time he’d touched someone? He’d put his hand on her corpse’s cheek. 

Davenport retches again, and this time, he leans over the bow just in case. He watches the water, the sensation passing, and he scowls at the dark sea.

He could join her. Could she even want him, still? The last decades of her life, she’d danced around him, still viewing him as too fragile and broken for his needs to be taken seriously. She probably thought he was delusional just for loving her, for still wanting her so desperately after everything. For thanking her, when she’d let him see her and touch her. Devotion never sat well with her, at least the way he did it. She never liked the way he raised her up above him. Or the way he pushed the hurt down, but sometimes he had to. There were more important concerns, always.

He’d wanted her. He’ll always want her. 

Davenport takes a few steps back and sits with his back against the mast, feeling hazy. He catches sight of the illusion out of the corner of his eye and dispels it with a wave of revulsion. Maybe he’ll try to fall asleep without her tonight. Or he’ll give up and bring her back, or just linger on her, meld memory and fantasy and want and need. On nights like these, he used to touch himself, but it doesn't feel like anything anymore. 

_ Imagine what she’d think of you, _ a sneering voice in his brain says, and he already has, hasn’t he? It’s most of what he allows for, usually. He curls in on himself, ignoring the aches in his body and the yawning emptiness inside of him in favor of the best kind of thoughts, the ones that fill him with meaning, with something akin to warmth. 

They’re not good thoughts, but they’re what push him forward. He wants more, always, more of them, more of her, even if she’s all hypothetical and angry. Or worse, in his memories, treating him like some barely-sentient burden, scowling at him while he sobs and whines and hits his arms against the wall, the floor, himself. She’d only stopped him if he did something that could hurt his head, so he did it a lot, so starved for any contact or attention, so desperate to silence the ever-present static, too, but when she’d grab at his hands, or put a shield around him if he’d jerk his head the wrong way, that was almost like love, like caring. 

It’s Lucretia. Of course he still wants her, more of her, any of her, he’s always needed her, really. He’d needed her even when he didn’t remember her, even when she was just fuzzy and angry and crying in front of him, and he was lost, and he was hurting, and she was the only person he ever had to think about.

“What caused that?” she’d say, as if expecting an answer, those large brown eyes searching his face, static exploding in front of him, and he’d ignore her, struggle to pull away, to free himself and shut his brain up with few brief, blissful moments of pain. 

He’d bitten her once, when he was frantic and she’d grabbed him, and she’d been protecting him, hadn’t she? And like an animal, he’d hurt her. Like the disgusting, pitiful excuse for a captain or lover or whatever she saw him as, who’d hurt her toward her end of their century together, ignored all that she was feeling, all that she needed and wanted.

After the Hunger was gone, he’d seen the scar he’d made on her. Gnome teeth are weapons in their own right, and he’d felt badly of course, not to mention that hot flash of guilt and disgust accompanying every reminder and memory of the decade.

She deserved better, she always deserved so much better. He lets self-hatred wash over him, and he relishes it, because what else can he do?

The most pleasurable and grounding is remembering how she’d spoken to him, when he’d visited her. Unnerved, maybe even repulsed that he’d want her still. Something rises in him, the reminder that he neglected and dirtied and ruined the only good thing in his life, that he’ll always be alone and unhappy and without her.

He was so grateful for her during the century, during the decade, every moment that they were alive together. She was everything, had she even known?

Here he is, now, without static, and he’s lost her too, and they never had the life together that they so desperately wanted—that he wanted, who knows what Lucretia ever really wanted, and just the thought is raw and painful and shoved down so quickly, she had to have wanted something—and they never got to just be happy together, without a care, with only each other to think about and not responsibilities and death and guilt.

Her face, her face… he only has one spell slot left, and he won’t waste this one. He needs to see her, like all the nights on the ship when he watched her work at her desk in near silence, just bathing in the warmth of her presence.

The illusion takes form, and in this moment, he could die, he’d love to die and just hold her again, hold her forever. She’s so soft and radiant and beautiful, and something in him leaps to see that smile that’s destroyed his heart. His head hurts, and he could fall asleep just staring at her empty eyes, breathing her name, praying he’ll get her again. The ache in him could tear him apart, easily. Why didn’t they get more time together? Why did she leave? Why wasn’t he allowed to just love her and care for her and protect her, in her final decades?

He knows why, and it hurts, and he stares at the illusion and whispers, “I love you,” and it’s the most hollow empty loveless thing he’s ever said. 

He knows why, and it hurts, and he’d give anything for the hurt to stop, but it never will, will it?

He knows why, and it hurts; it’s too much. It’s everything, and that feeling, the memory of her face and her voice and the warmth and safety of her embrace, her mere presence, is fading more and more with each passing hour.

Davenport wakes up before the sun, and he wishes he hadn’t. The ocean stretches on forever, and it’s beautiful, and he wonders what she got to see of this world, if she enjoyed it at all. He eats jerky for breakfast and picks at an old wound. He makes plans for the day, and they’re not good plans. She’d be disappointed in him. She’d be disgusted. Worse, she might feel guilty, as if she’s complicit in where he is right now. The pitiful way that he is. 

Well, she’s dead. And she knew by the end that he’s broken. She seemed to understand that this is just how he is, how he’s always been and always will be. But she never liked it. If only he could have done something about it.

Going out to sea isn’t good for him, but it’s all he knows how to do. The sea is for grief. The sea is for pretending you can ever recover. 

Davenport peels a grapefruit and stares at it. He puts it down, throws the rind overboard. 

He’s got his spell slots back, and nothing else to do today but think about her.

He tortured her for a century, cursed her to their living hell, and always prioritized his pitiful excuse for a mission over her emotional well-being. He forced her hand, made her single-handedly take action against the devastation that their relics brought to the world. He pretended they were lovers, that there was anything loving about the way they’d touch each other out of desperation and need, and that had made what she did for him seem like a betrayal. 

She deserved better, and a death free of him is the least he can give her. He’ll give her another century, unless the ocean will help him along.

He knows what she’d think of him. He knows, now, what she thought of him. There’s a reason she did what she did.

He’s okay with it. He’d never betray her. She could have done anything to him; she got rid of the Hunger when he was too weak and stupid and cowardly to have ever done anything half as well as she did. It took her a fraction of the time to come up with an idea than the whole crew combined. She sacrificed so much more than he did. She did it for them, he could tell, and she had sobbed on his chest, and he’d forgiven her, endlessly assured her of his love for her.

He’d told her, “I still want you,” and she had stared at him with the widest eyes.

She hadn’t said, “You can’t,” but she’d been surprised in the worst way. Davenport pulls the grapefruit apart, remembers the last time he touched anyone, the cool softness of her cheek, and he puts it down. 

They all expected him to be angry. He could never do that to her, never hurt her, why couldn’t at least she see that?

Not for the first time, he wonders how the rest of them could have lived with themselves. A part of him wants to go to Taako and Lup and Barry and demand… something, anything,_ fix this, please, because I can’t. _ But that’s what got them into all this, isn’t it? His weakness, his failures as their captain and his stupidity, all of his inadequacies as a person. As her lover. 

No wonder it panned out this way, no wonder he’d lost everything. He got all he wanted, and only at the cost of love and respect, or a semblance of it. 

Maybe none of it was real. He doesn’t know if she really loved him. It’s better not to know. It’s always been better to just not think.

But then again, he still does. He thinks of her and her soft, friendly eyes, the way she would grin and joke and pull him close, say, "I love you" without hesitation. Her scent, still lingering in his nose. How she pleased him, and how he relished pleasing her. 

It's impossible not to remember how good she always made him feel, and to bathe in what lingers of those feelings. To hope desperately that he’ll see her again. 

He won’t-- he can’t. But she’s all he wants, all he dreams of.

He'll stay on his ship as long as he needs to. He's alone out here, but at least he has the memory of her with him forever. That's all he needs. She's all he needs, really, and when she took his memories, he was glad at least to have her.

Anything would be better than this. Anything. 

Davenport throws the fruit overboard and casts his first illusion of the day. It’s not comforting, but it’s as close to her as he’ll ever be again.

**Author's Note:**

> title from "jezebel" by iron & wine


End file.
